MNI China Daily Summary: Thursday, August 13

LIQUIDITY: The People's Bank of China (PBOC) conducted CNY118.5 billion via 7-day reverse repos, with the rate unchanged at 1.40%. There was a net drain of CNY20 billion after offsetting maturities of CNY138.5 billion, according to Wind Information

RATES: The seven-day weighted average interbank repo rate for depository institutions (DR007) rose to 1.4522% on Thursday from 1.4444%, Wind Information showed. The overnight repo average increased to 1.3164% from 1.3162%.

YUAN: The currency strengthened to 7.1755 against the dollar, from 7.1911 at Wednesday's close. The PBOC set the dollar-yuan central parity rate lower at 7.1350, compared with 7.1418 on Tuesday. The fixing was estimated at 7.1768 by Bloomberg survey today.

BONDS: The yield on 10-year China Government Bonds was last at 1.6800%, unchanged from Wednesday's close, according to Choice data.

STOCKS: The Shanghai Composite Index gained 0.48% to 3,683.46, while the CSI300 index was up 0.79% to 4,176.58. The Hang Seng Index rose 2.58% to 25,613.67.

FROM THE PRESS: Consumers can receive an interest subsidy of 1% on loans for single purchases of no more than CNY50,000 for goods including vehicles and home furnishing, Yicai.com reported, citing a statement from the Ministry of Finance and other departments. Businesses in eight consumer service sectors including catering and tourism can also enjoy such subsidies on loans up to CNY1 million for a single entity, which is expected to leverage a larger scale of funds to boost consumption compared to direct fiscal subsidies, the newspaper said, citing analysts.

China Evergrande, the world's most heavily-indebted real estate developer, will delist from Hong Kong's stock exchange on Aug 25, after being suspended from trading for 18 months, cls.cn reported. Evergrande's delisting is in line with market expectations and signals an acceleration of industry risks, analysts said. As of November 2023, the group’s unpaid maturing debts totalled CNY316 billion, in addition to CNY205 billion in overdue commercial bills, the financial publisher said.

China's e-commerce logistics index reached 112.0 points in July, up 0.2 from June, setting a new high for the year, Securities Daily reported, citing data from the China Federation of Logistics & Purchasing. The sub-index of total business volume rose by 0.1 to 130.9 to a new high, mainly driven by national consumer subsidies and booming e-commerce consumption in rural areas, the newspaper said.